russet pain
by clairebare
Summary: a new case changes everything for teresa and patrick.
1. Chapter 1

It breaks my heart.

He died trying to save them.

His hand is still curved around the metal banister at the top of the stairs.

The young father endured slash after slash from a razor-sharp blade.

Deep cuts on his chest and his arms and one cruel stroke across his throat.

All to stop whatever devil this was from getting past him and reaching his wife and child.

Jane stands and continues up the stairs to the bedroom.

I stay back looking over the body.

The man is Broderick Paine, thirty-three. Curly blonde hair, athletic build. Dressed in a tee-shirt and pajama bottoms.

Even dead, he is one of the most beautiful men I've ever seen.

Not that I've seen many men I'd call beautiful.

Just Jane, actually. Of course.

Ever since we started with the FBI, I've been waiting for Jane to….declare himself.

No matter what, this is a hell of an opportunity. I'm glad to be here.

The job at the FBI is amazing. I'm starting to enjoy Austin. I meet new people, new men, everyday.

Even if Jane never makes a move, I will be fine.

Who am I kidding?

Despite everything, I want Jane. God, how I want him.

I keep thinking. Once we settle in. Once I get a place to live. Once Jane gets a place to live. Once we get a few cases behind us. Once Jane gets a couch.

I notice the victim's glassy eyes are the exact color of Jane's.

And something's strange.

There's no wedding band.

There's a clear indentation and the skin is a little paler so it's obvious this man wore a band. But either he removed it or his attacker did.

"Jane. Come take a look at this." I glance up at the bedroom. "Jane?"

I take a quick cell phone photo of the bare finger, then stand and make my way up to the bedroom.

A six-year old girl in a nightgown is asleep on the king-size bed. Her face is obscured by thick blonde curls.

Her mother sits on the edge of the bed.

This is Angelina Russet Paine, 32, and her daughter, Violet.

She is willowy and fair.

Lovely. Like Venus rising from the sea in that early Renaissance painting.

Jane is kneeling at her feet holding her hands in his.

I step into the room.

"Jane?"

He doesn't turn.

And I think I've already lost him.


	2. Chapter 2

We attend the funeral.

Jane hovers near Angelina and Violet as Broderick Paine is lowered into the ground.

He fought valiantly and protected his wife and child from a knife-wielding maniac.

Just like Jane didn't get the chance to.

The service is over.

I half expect Jane to get in the limo with the family.

The cemetery clears out. He leans against a tree.

I walk over.

"Spot anyone interesting among the mourners?" I say.

He looks startled that I'm even here.

"Interesting? No. Listen, there's something I forgot to ask Angelina. I'll see you later."

What could he possibly have left to ask this woman? He's spent every spare moment with her.

I'd guess she's a 30D, if that's his question. Tiny busty wraith that she is.

He walks off toward his car.

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Broderick Paine had been a sketchy character.

Their huge place was sublet from a rich European who bought it as an investment property. Furnishings were all on Visa. No insurance. No bank account.

She said he was in finance. Didn't have any further details.

If it didn't make me seem like a jealous bitch, I would call her vapid.

The little girl, Violet, is beautiful and not quite of this world like her mother.

I wonder if Angela and Charlotte were like this. Or maybe they would have been if they'd lost Patrick?

Speaking of whom, where the hell is he?

I haven't seen him since the funeral this morning.

I reach my front door and put my key in the lock when I spot it on the ground. The black velvet box.

Inside, a gold ring. Broderick Paine's missing band. Scratched and not quite circular anymore.

Where the hell are you Jane? Whoever did this murder wants to play.

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3am.

My eyes pop open.

I sit up in bed.

Not Paine's ring, Teresa.

Jane's ring.

Jane took his ring off?

Very likely.

And sent it to me?

I'm up and hopping on one foot as I throw on my jeans and call Cho.


	3. Chapter 3

I jump in my car. I try Jane's phone. He answers.

"Jane. I found a ring box with your wedding band in it at my front door."

A long pause. "Now how did that get there?" He sounds distracted.

"Jane, you took off your wedding ring?"

"Uh, yes, Lisbon. I felt it was time." I hear a crying child in the background.

He felt it was time?

"But why would the ring wind up on my doorstep, Jane?"

"No idea, Lisbon. Look…I'll call you tomorrow. Get some rest, alright?"

I call back Cho and tell him Jane's Ok.

But I just don't see myself falling back to sleep tonight.

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From my car, I have a fine view of the house.

The two-story glass and wood Malibu-style beach house plopped down in the suburbs of Austin like the farmhouse in the midst of Oz.

I observe Jane up in the bedroom, sans jacket and shoes but, thank god, avec pants, shirt and socks. He's busy tucking in Angelina. She's wearing another of her white handkerchief linen nightgowns. Why does everything in her wardrobe look like the perfect thing to be deflowered in?

She obediently lies down. Jane carefully wraps her in the covers and plants a kiss on her forehead. The corners of her enigmatic and possibly stupid mouth turn up and she closes her eyes. In her place, I would have screamed and come.

He disappears for a minute and returns carrying a weepy Violet in a matching nightgown. He pulls back the bedclothes and slips her into her mother's arms.

This is the Patrick Jane version of Barbie's Dream House. He's enacting his lost life up there. How long will it be till he slips under the covers too?

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A half-hour later and things have only gone downhill.

Now Jane is conveying armloads of stuffed animals from Violet's room and arranging them around their sleeping forms.

He finally seems satisfied with the tableau vivant he's created. A vision of curly blond creatures, two of them human.

He pulls a club chair up close to the bed, gets up to dim the lights and a minute later, I see him slumped in the chair, his angelic curls glowing.

I notice I'm crying when the first tear drips off my chin.


	4. Chapter 4

I open my eyes with a start. 4:43 am.

All is calm in the Barbie bedroom.

Angelina and Violet and a petting zoo of stuffed animals on the bed.

The silhouette of the beautiful Patrick Jane languidly posed on the club chair.

The room is dark but his curls capture what moonlight there is.

He's watching the woman he's obsessed with.

And I'm watching him.

Something on the first floor catches my eye.

There's a figure mounting the stairs.

Black robe, rubber mask, gleaming knife.

I'm out of the car and running.

I'm through the door.

Then everything goes black.

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I come to my senses cuffed to the banister near the top of the stairs.

The very spot where Broderick Paine died.

The masked figure is standing a few steps above me.

"Whoever the hell you are, I won't let you hurt him. " I hiss.

"Silly Teresa. None of this is about hurting Patrick. He'll just be collateral damage here."

He sits down next to me on the stairs.

"After all the years you waited, just when you thought you had a chance of getting your heart's desire, he's been stolen from you, hasn't he?"

His gloved hand strokes my hair. "And you can't compete with his lost life. With his golden wife and child."

He runs his fingers down the side of my neck. They dance across my collarbone and along the V of my blouse.

He puts his finger under my chin. "I'd counted on Patrick Jane being intrigued by the plight of Angelina and Violet."

"I figured any involvement on his part would fill you with rage and jealousy. But I couldn't have predicted how deeply he'd fall. He's always been rather mad, hasn't he? You understand that now, don't you?"

I'm starting to place the voice. "So the murder, his ring showing up at my house. Everything was done to hurt me?"

He nods.

"You've gone to an awful lot of trouble, Volker." I say. He takes off the mask.

"I thought about killing you, Teresa. Everyday, until I escaped prison. But I wanted you to suffer. To realize how pathetic and inept you are. To see how little it took to lure your beloved away."

He smiles. "And then for you to find his body cut to ribbons because he tried to play the hero."

"But by showing up tonight, you inspire me with an even better scenario."


	5. Chapter 5

I ran into the house hoping to stop a Red John wannabe from stabbing Patrick and Angelina and Violet while they sleep. But the killer overcame me.

I woke up to find myself cuffed to the banister looking at Tommy Volker.

Somehow, Volker designed this whole thing to hurt me.

He came up with a murderous scheme to lure Patrick into madness with a fantasy version of his dead family.

And the plan worked. I can't believe it but Jane was lost to me the minute he saw the newly widowed mother and her orphaned child. Despite my love for him, and I know he knows I love him, all he really wanted was to slip back into the life that was ripped away from him.

Volker didn't expect to find me in this house tonight and now says he's inspired to torture me even more. I shudder to think of something worse than finding Jane's butchered body.

"Volker, if you lay a hand on—"

"I intend to do Patrick a favor. I'm going to give him warning that I'm coming. You can't say that's a bad thing can you, Teresa?"

Volker stuffs a rag in my mouth. I struggle against my handcuffs.

He pulls out his cell phone. Puts it on speaker. I can hear the muffled ring on the second floor behind the bedroom door.

"Hello?" Patrick's sleepy voice.

"Patrick, Tommy Volker here."

"Volker. To what do I owe this nauseating conversation?"

It isn't hard to get under Volker's skin. His face turns red.

"I'm actually here to give you your dream come true. A chance you missed and never thought you'd get again." Volker says. "A chance to save your little family."

Volker is looking at me like I ought to be impressed. I cross my eyes. Infantile, I know, but satisfying nonetheless.

"I have Teresa Lisbon with me right outside the bedroom."

Volker pulls the rag out of my mouth.

"Jane!" He stuffs it back in my mouth.

Volker continues, "Here's the thing Patrick. I'm standing here with a very sharp knife and poor Teresa cuffed to the top of the stairs.

"You can come out here and protect Teresa from me or stay in there and protect Angelina and her child."

There's a long pause. I can hear Jane breathing.

Jane's voice is hoarse.

"I'm sorry, Teresa."


	6. Chapter 6

So that's it.

Jane is sorry.

He'd rather save Angelina and Violet than me.

I wish Volker had killed me so I wouldn't have had to hear him say it.

He didn't seem to agonize over his decision. I wasn't even a close second.

Tears run down my face.

Volker tosses down the phone and laughs and points at me and laughs some more. Stupid hyena.

I don't care if he sees me fall apart. Don't care if his triumph is complete. I have no pride. I have nothing.

Where I stand in Jane's life is clear.

Volker pulls the gag out of my mouth.

"Volker, just get it over with."

He stuffs the gag back and laughs harder.

"Teresa, do you really think I would let you miss Patrick's death?"

He uncuffs me from the banister and drags me up the stairs.

He cuffs me to the handle of the door opposite the bedroom.

He opens the bedroom door very carefully.

In the dim light, I can make out Jane's angelic curls peeping over the top of the club chair and Angelina and Violet snuggled amidst the stuffed menagerie on the bed.

Volker tiptoes a few steps into the room.

I attempt to make some warning sounds but I fail miserably.

Volker is already leaning over Jane plunging in his knife over and over.

He's in a frenzy. His laugh fills the air.

Oh god. I squeeze my eyes shut. I can only pray Jane dies quickly.

The door I'm cuffed to is yanked open.

I stagger back into the room.

My handcuffs spring open.

Jane.

With a paper clip.

I'm so glad to see him. He looks so worried and beautiful. He hugs me. Who the hell is Volker stabbing in there?

He pulls out the gag.

"Omigod, Jane. Don't tell me those are stuffed ani-"

Jane replaces the gag with his hand.

Don't want to distract Volker who's still going to town on the poor little lions and hamsters.

Jane sweeps me into his arms and carries me down the stairs.

He's strong and sturdy and smells like himself only more so. So I shut my mouth and nestle my face in his neck.

On our way down, we pass Cho coming up.

We pass Angelina and Violet sitting in a squad car.

Jane places me in his car and takes me home.

Then he carries me up the stairs and slips into bed with me.

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Turns out Jane knew it was a set-up as soon as he saw his lookalike stabbed to death.

He decided the best way to get the killer to reveal himself was to play along and enact a fantasy family life with Angelina and Violet.

They both knew they were part of an investigation so they played their parts.

His ring had been missing since he'd woken that morning so his theory was the killer had drugged him and slipped it off but he couldn't figure out the reason.

It was only when I called Jane and told him his wedding ring had been sent to me that he realized the whole set-up was aimed at me, not him.

Who would suffer most at having Jane take off his wedding ring for a faux family just like his old one?

It was then that he knew Volker was behind it.

Figuring that the grand finale would occur that night, he obscured Angelina and Violet with a pile of stuffed animals so they could crawl out, then dimmed the lights and replaced himself with a passel of curly blonde plush poodles.

As soon as he heard Volker skulking around the house, he'd called me but since unbeknownst to Jane, Volker had my phone, he didn't get an answer. Then, he called Cho.

Jane hadn't known I was in the house and at Volker's mercy until Volker made the phone call and made him choose between me and his new family.

That's why he said he'd rather save Angelina and Violet than me figuring Volker would get off on seeing my reaction and not be able to resist killing Jane first in front of me.

He wound up buying enough time for Cho to arrive with back-up.

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Turns out Volker won't ever see the outside of a prison.

Turns out, Patrick thinks Angelina is as thick as a plank and Violet is a brat.

Turns out, he would rather save me than anyone in the world.


End file.
